Interpersonal Skills: Enhancing My Communication Skills

At home, with my husband, any conflict we have, I know needs to be addressed and addressed in a way where I am confronting him immediately and being completely honest. I can use the words I wish to use as they come to me and can say exactly what I am feeling without sugar coating it. At work, with my coworkers, any conflict that occurs, I must strategically think about how to address the conflict, when to address it and the process that will occur after addressing the conflict.

2.1 It is self-evident that communication and interpersonal skills are crucial in the workplace. Good two-way communication is important to enable the flow of information in an effective way whether it be verbal or non-verbal. Good communication has a positive impact on the performance of the team including; everyone is clear what is expected from them, they receive good feedback and recognition of achievements which makes staff feel valued and boosts employee morale. The manager needs to be approachable and have a non-threatening manner so

Many people are not aware of the communication skills that they lack, most will argue that they have perfect communication skills. Taking interpersonal communication has taught me that my skills are very poor. I walked in thinking there was nothing I can learn about communication and realized that I know little to nothing about communication. Since starting this class I’ve narrowed the skills I need to work on to the following four which includes listening, being more supportive and active, understanding, and improving my self concept. Although all four of these skills are something I can improve I think listening is my main problem.

Throughout the semester there were various aspects of communication that I felt applied to me. It was not, however, until the latter half of the semester that I experienced my greatest revelation regarding my abilities as a communicator. While studying the 12th chapter in the textbook, Interplay The Process of Interpersonal Communication, I learned

On a crisp autumn day in 2016, while hidden away from the cares of my daily routine in my family room, I was called upon to elaborate on an important aspect of my life. It took some time for consideration to determine how to best portray a journey I have taken in managing conflict, as I am not a young woman. Decades filled with the blessings of being the mother of disabled children, years lived as a single parent, as well as the process of maturation, tempered by the fires of adversity, have molded me into who I am today. As I reflected, I wondered if would I know how to deal with conflict as I do now without the life experiences I have had? Certainly not! The following paragraphs will describe my primary conflict style and why I use it, how I have changed constructively in this area, how the other four styles of conflict management may serve me, and where I hope to arrive as I continue to make my way along the journey of my life.

SC4 Demonstrated high level written and verbal communication skills and high level interpersonal skills including a capacity to develop constructive relationships with students, parents and other staff.

1A. My interpersonal communication goal that I want to improve is, learning how to start a conversation with strangers. My daily routine/tasks are repeatable. My days consist of taking the two older kids to school, cooking, doing chores around the house, and taking care of my youngest. My youngest child is not in daycare. She definitely knows how to keep me busy throughout the day when she’s not sleeping. Being a stay at home mom, I don’t really get the chance to socialize or speak to strangers on a regular basis. In addition, I love to hibernate and stay home during the winter.

There are many ideas from Petersen's book that I can use to apply what I learned to enhance my own interpersonal communication. I will use most of the techniques to help improve relationships and communication with my family members and in the work setting. In the past, when having communication problems, I noticed that what the other person said and what they truly meant may be different. In the future, I will use the decode technique by stating what I heard the person say and then I will ask the person if that is what they meant (Petersen, 2015, p. 62). This technique will be useful to clear up confusion in the communication process both for the listener and speaker.

According to Joshua Gowin Ph.D, “In the 1970s Kenneth Thomas and Ralph Kilmann identified five main styles of dealing with conflict that vary in their degrees of cooperativeness and assertiveness. They argued that people typically have a preferred conflict resolution style. However they also noted that different styles were most useful in different situations. They developed the Thomas-Kilmann Conflict Mode Instrument (TKI) which helps you to identify which style you tend towards when conflict arises (Gowin). These five main styles are Competitive, Accommodating, Avoiding, Collaborating, and Compromising (Gowin). As well, “Conflict elicits stress, our self-defense mechanism against harmful elements in our world. Stress tells us one of two things: I've been hurt, or I'm about to be hurt. Naturally, we take the first thing seriously. If we're hurt, our brain shifts into action mode. We release adrenaline within seconds and cortisol within minutes, causing us to become more impulsive” (Gowin). Brains are ‘hardwired’ to respond to conflict based on past experiences, using that knowledge to further progress itself in the natural

Interpersonal Skill Set for Minister is an amazing book full of great wisdom. The book contains many strengths that make it a must read for every minister. The first strength is found within the opening chapters of the book. Social media and technology is a blessing that can do great things for the church, but often times it is seen as an enemy. Many churches and ministers are out of date in the department of technology. Being out of date in this category is not completely bad, but there are many great benefits from technology that these churches are missing out on. This book does a great job at giving these strengths and encouraging ministers to take advantage of the benefits technology.

A report on the interpersonal skills of listening, questioning and feedback and the benefits of these in the engineering field

In the 21st century our communication mediums have changed, know we Whats App Facebook or email rather than calling or visiting in person. What hasn 't changed is that when we communicate most of the time another human being is on the other end and. This chapter will discuss not only how to communicate with diplomacy but how messages of communication are interpreted. In the workplace communication is probably one of the most important factors as people need to receive clearly communicated messages to be on the right track. It could be that you need to so some public speaking at the workplace and not only is your confidence being shook up, your nerves are on edge worrying how to communicate you message. Not only how we communicate with others that impacts our success what’s also a key part is how we communicate with ourselves and overcome internal negative dialogue. Did you know that only 8% of our communication is based on the words we say? Also did you know that 37% of our communication is based on our tone of voice? Did you know that the remaining 55% comes from our facial expressions and body language? If you find this hard to believe just think of when someone says something to you and they come across as rude. More often than not it was the way they said it vs the actual words they said. When communication is open and employees are connected

There are five styles of dealing with conflict, which come from the Thomas Kilmann Model. These strategies can be considered in terms of who wins and who loses. Other models use different labels but express the same ideas as Thomas and Kilmann (2016), in that these five styles show the balance between concern for self and concern for other. Avoidance style is where everyone pretends there is no problem, which can be useful if people need to ‘cool down’ prior to having any discussion or the conflict is of little importance; however, the conflict may resurface and create a lose/lose situation

When conflict arises, I tend to avoid and act like the problem doesn't even exist or sometimes I communicate indirectly about the situation. I let go of my rights and let the other person thinks he or she is right, until we are

While introducing the study of conflict resolution within communications it is extremely vital for us as human beings to be able to seek out the defiance and or uncivil disobedience so that then he or she may begin to eliminate the arising communicative conflict. The way conflict resolution works is by identifying the problem then next is to evaluate why such circumstances are so, and finally he or she should seek to terminate the opposition that is causing the conflict. Interactive and or social conflicts can be thought of in its simplest form, as an incompatibility trait that other humans may or may not share. Such personality traits may offend and or produce disharmony and or self-contradictions of one’s own self beliefs, goals, and or values by which only then make the conversation that much harder to bare.